by Abby James
“If at some point you find anything out about my father, I deserve to know.”
He stopped, then slowly turned around. “Of course you do. But at the moment I would say McGilus is more worried about the skurk. They pose a greater threat.”
“And what are you worried about?”
He shoved his hands into the pockets of his pants. “A great many things that will give you nightmares at night.”
“Do they give you nightmares?”
“I’m not that easily scared. Besides I don’t sleep.”
“Holy shit, you’re for real?”
“Apparently I’m not so human after all.”
“I thought vampires slept in coffins.”
“If you find one that does, let me know.” He spun on his heel and marched away.
Another fairy tale myth bites the dust.
3
The class had begun when I entered. I mouthed sorry to Mr. French and made my way toward the back of the room. Streams of light brightened the class from huge arched windows that reached stories high. With no drapes to block the sun it cast long golden lines across everyone’s desks. Besides Ms Lane’s room this had to be the brightest room in the castle.
“Miss Wright, I believe.”
Dammit. He was going to make a spectacle of me. I turned to face him. “Mr. French.”
“Is there a reason for your tardiness?”
“Yes, sir. But I am afraid you will have to speak with Dean McGilus if you want an answer.”
Mr. French’s brow drew down in a heavy scowl. “I beg your pardon. Are you being insolent?”
“No, I’m doing exactly what Dean McGilus instructed me to do.”
He held my gaze for yet more breaths. “Take a seat down the front.”
I resisted rolling my eyes. This was not high school. I had to put up with enough teacher bullying back then. A few years out and here I was again being treated like the misbehaving teenager I had once been.
Juliet waved to me from the end of the front row. Seeing a spare seat next to her, I beamed a smile at Mr. French and headed down the front, avoiding the curious eyes of the other students.
“There has been talk of you attending all the classes. I didn’t think it was—”
“Miss Fallow, the arrival of a late student is not an excuse to talk.”
Juliet pinched her lips tight and turned back to Mr. French.
“Perhaps you would like to repeat what I was saying before we were interrupted.”
“You were reminding us of the backwash of energy that can happen if any extra uptake is not properly dissipated.”
He narrowed his eyes at her as if annoyed she had gotten it right. After giving her a hard stare he returned his attention to the rest of the class. “We shall try with something small to start with. I am well aware all of you have been working with larger objects, but for the point of this demonstration we are starting again. Is that understood?”
Everyone mumbled a less than enthusiastic response.
I leaned over to whisper in Juliet’s ear. “Mr. French sounds like he has everyone on the edge of their seats.”
“We’ve done this class before, but he persists on reiterating the same lesson over and over every time someone makes a mistake. We’re all beyond this, but Bert, the guy with the shaved head, two rows behind us,” she jerked her head in his direction, “put himself through a hedge a week back because he didn’t take into account the reciprocal effect. And now we all have to suffer by doing the lesson again.”
“Mr. London, you may hand out the stones,” Mr French barked.
A long, thick necked boy rose from the front row and made his way to Mr French, who held a brown sack out for him to take.
London started at our end, but hesitated with me, looking at the stone and then at me.
“You can skip Miss Wright.”
Without much expression he moved down the row handing out the stones. Juliet looked across to me and rolled her eyes. “I was moving these stones back when I first came here. I’m not very good at my ability, but I can move stones at least without impaling myself into a fence.”
“What do you mean?”
“Telekinetics involves manipulating the potential energy within an object. You may think non-living objects have no energy, but when you’re a telekinetic you can feel the energy rippling through everything around you. Living creatures have the most energy, of course. And don’t go thinking that the bigger objects have greater energy because in some cases it is the complete opposite. But I digress. Moving objects involves exciting the potential energy. If the object has enough energy within, you only have to manipulate that. If it has little energy, you will be required to tap into some of your own reserves. If the object is large and contains no energy at all, you may be required to take in energy from elsewhere so as not to exhaust yourself. It is important to dissipate the energy through controlled channels rather than simply releasing the residual when you are finished, or it can have a reverse effect.”
“Sounds dangerous.” At last I finally had an explanation for what had happened when I first shook hands with McGilus. He was a telekinetic, and I had accidentally vacuumed in his ability only to suffer the backwash.
“Yes, it is if you happen to be standing on the edge of a building or in front of something sharp when you forget that golden rule.”
Manipulating all the abilities was going to be harder than I had thought, with each having its own rules of use.
Juliet held up the small olive green stone. “This is a scillion stone. Although small it contains a lot of potential energy, which means it requires little of a telekinetic’s energy to shift and none needed from elsewhere. That means no kick back.”
“You may practice where you are,” Mr French said.
Juliet placed the stone back on the table. “Watch this.”
I watched, breath held, as Juliet hunched over the stone, her concentration absolute. All it took were two breaths and her stone slid across the desk. She grabbed it before it slid right off.
“That was amazing.”
She screwed up her nose. “Not that amazing. Scillion stones are what the beginners use. They’re not hard to move. I managed it on my first try. It’s like they want to move.”
“What is it you feel when you move objects?”
“At first it can give you a mild headache. But once you develop that tends to disappear. It’s about finding the potential energy in the object you wish to move. Sometimes it can feel like an invisible pressure pressing against you. If you’re not experienced it’s best to stick with objects that hold a lot of potential energy. That way you protect yourself. It requires too much of your own energy otherwise. And it’s even more dangerous to attempt to draw in energy from elsewhere. That is an acquired skill to master. It’s a weird feeling taking in energy that is not your own, and it’s usually unstable until you get the hang of it, which can take years. It also makes it harder to handle, plus you have to know exactly how much to take in. Beginners tend to take in too much and end up with the backlog of unused energy they need to get rid of in a safe manner.”
“I see how it can get dangerous.”
“No one’s killed themselves while under instruction, but there have been cases of it happening. Mr. French had us read those particular cases in our text books before we started doing any practical classes.”
“Makes sense.”
Mr French strolled down the row behind us, peering over everyone’s shoulders. He paused at the last, a boy whose face was scrunched so tight his eyes all but disappeared. His stone inched its way across the table. When it had moved far enough, he sat back and heaved a sigh of relief.
“That boy’s only been here four months. Poor thing is hopeless.”
“He looks nervous as all hell.”
“It’s seems you have all mastered kindergarten. Let us see how you manage the next stage. Mr. London, the next bag.”
London slipped out of his seat and hurried down
to scoop the second brown sack off the table at the front of the room.
Juliet leaned over to whisper, “this will be the quatran stone. The next stone up in the beginners range. It’s a little bigger, and has half the potential energy.” “I can move it but not as far”
Once London had given her the stone, a reddish brown rock, Juliet started right away, hunching down again and staring hard at the lumpy thing. It took a little longer for this stone to move, but once it did it slid to the edge of the desk. Juliet smiled. “I found that one hard when I first came here. At least I can see some progress. It’s a small object so even though it doesn’t contain a lot of energy for you to play with, it isn’t overly hard once you know how to manipulate its energy. I only used a small amount of my own.”
It seemed the rest of the class also found it of little challenge, except the new boy, whose brow sweated. Or maybe that was because Mr French had positioned himself behind the poor kid again. I held my breath waiting for his stone to move, and I practically felt Juliet’s will emanating hopeful vibes in his direction. We all waited until we heard the telltale scrape of the lumpy stone scratching its way across his desk. I was tempted to cheer.
Not satisfied with everyone’s progress, he said, “some of you failed to move your stone as far as I would have liked, given the size of it.”
Juliet leaned over, “he never gives anyone a compliment on their effort.”
“We shall progress. For our next object, I would like you all to stand and move away from your desk.”
The scraping of chairs drowned out the rest of what Mr. French said, so he paused, taking a breath, as if to calm his anger and waited until there was silence. Moving was the signal for many to talk, so he continued to stare in silence. When no one got the hint, he yelled, “We shall not break until everyone has completed the task.” Once there was quiet, he said, “ Find yourself some space.”
Juliet gave me a grimace and lead me away from the end desk.
“This looks serious,” I said.
“This is where some will fail, including me.” She gave me a weak smile. “Mr French likes to have people screw up and when no one does he leaps over a few steps and makes us try something harder just so he has a good number of students to make an example of.”
“Sounds like most of my high school teachers.”
“Doesn’t it just. What is it about teaching that makes teachers think they can be assholes?”
“Mr London, once again.” He waved to the desk out the front where black rocks about a foot high were arranged in rows of three. “Mr. Falcon and Miss Grundle, you may help Mr London. I feel this will be our last attempt as many of you will fail.” There was a sneer in his voice.
“He sounds excited,” I said.
Juliet just pressed her lips together and shrugged. No longer did she look as confident as when she was moving the first two stones.
“Please make sure that the area behind you is clear. Do not stand behind anyone unless you want them in your lap.”
I nodded to Juliet, positioning myself safely to the side of her.
Falcon was a sandy blond guy, cute if not for his large nose and closely set eyes. He placed the large black lump of rock he’d carried over onto the floor in front of Juliet. It looked as though it had been hacked from a quarry.
“What is that?”
“Balsic rock. It holds no potential energy whatsoever. A lump any bigger than this and few in this class could shift it. None of us have developed our own energetic state to any sufficient level and the borrowed amount needed is out of any of our skill set.”
“Can you shift this?”
“Sometimes I’ve managed it. But I’m not always consistent. I lack confidence in my capability. It’s hit and miss with me whether I succeed half the time.”
“You’ll succeed this time because I’m your cheer squad.”
“Oh god, don’t say that. It will make me nervous.”
“You’re doing much better than me. I can’t even find my ability.” I winked at her.
She gave me a small smile than turned back to focus on the balsic rock.”
“Slowly. Do you understand me? We will take this slowly. I want to see perfection not speed. If any of you move, we will be spending the next month with the balsic rock.”
Juliet heaved a sigh and cast a quick look at me.
“You’ve already done it before. You can do it again.”
She nodded, then rolled her neck like she was a sprinter on the blocks.
“Begin when ready. Focus is the main task,” Mr French said as he walked amongst the class. Only now, with the potential for accidents did Mr. French seem to be enjoying himself.
Juliet inhaled deep, clenched her fists and leveled her eyes on the rock. As with the last two times her eyes squinted in concentration. I glanced to the rock to see it remained in the place Falcon had placed it. A thin line of sweat broke out on Juliet’s brow, and I felt the urge to mop it away. Poor thing was really nervous.
She closed her eyes and took another big breath. When she opened them again, she raised her arms, fists still clenched, and leaned forward focusing her will toward the rock.
By now the thin line of sweat ran in trails down to her eyes. I’d never seen someone concentrate as hard as this.
A sudden shout echoed around the room. I glanced up to see a girl falling backward onto her ass. Juliet snapped out of her concentration for a moment and looked over. Her face paled.
“Miss Mills, our first,” Mr French announced with glee.
When Juliet looked back at me I nodded to her, and gave an encouraging smile. “You can do this. I know you can.”
“I’m usually one of the failures. Mr French writes a list of them on the board and places a mark next to each every time you fail. I’ve lost count of the amount of times my name appears up there. I think he does it so the rest of the class can easily see who is responsible for holding them back in their training.”
“Name to shame. What an asshole. No way would anyone gain any confidence in their ability when taught like that.”
“I don’t think he wants anyone to become better than him.”
“Double asshole. They should sack teachers like him.”
“He’s married to a member of the council, apparently.”
“That makes it worse. McGilus probably only puts up with him because he has no choice.”
“I think she was the reason he got his position here teaching.”
“No doubt.”
“Why do I hear talking?” Mr French barked.
Thank god I wasn’t a telekinetic. But poor Juliet. She looked so miserable with the idea that she would yet again find her name up on the board with strikes against her. How many of the students had picked on her because she’d forced them all to start at the scillion stone again?
There was something I could do for her, but I shouldn’t. God, it was bad of me to even think about it, but if I touched, maybe our combined abilities could move the rock farther along.
I watched her clench her fists and jaw muscles. The urge to touch her twitched my fingers. Don’t do it. You don’t know how to manipulate telekinetic energy. But poor Juliet was going to fail. I could see it in her eyes. She’d already given up hope of succeeding.
She blinked her eyes to remove the sweat, but didn’t dare wipe it away with her sleeve, no doubt in case it interfered with her concentration. Someone else yelled out in dismay and flew backward onto their ass. I looked over at Mr French as he strode across to the unfortunate victim, wearing a smirk, his hands clasped together as if about to clap out his victory.
I stepped forward and touched Juliet lightly on the elbow. “You can do it,” I whispered disguising my touch for a comforting pat.
I felt the instant flow of her energy enter into me. My heart went out to her when I discovered how measly it was. I’d had a taste of McGilus and Luca before so I guess it wasn’t fair that I should compare her power to their own, but I doubted she had
any hope of moving the balsic with such a small surge.
Remembering what McGilus had me do when I took his energy, I focused on the rock along with Juliet and the thing nudged back an inch. With the noise of it scraping along the floor Juliet let out a whoop.
“Sir, sir, I did it.”
“I beg your pardon,” Mr French said as he strode across the room toward us.
“I moved it, sir. And I’m still standing,” she continued babbling in her joy.
“It does not seem to have moved to me,” he said, arching an eyebrow as he looked at the rock.
“But it did. Didn’t it, Samara?”
I nodded, but could see the skepticism in Mr French’s eyes. He was relying on Juliet to be one of the failures.
Mr French shook his head. “Miss Fallow, it is inadvisable to draw attention to yourself anymore than you usually do.”
I caught two guys sniggering behind Mr French.
“Visible proof, Miss Fallow.” He turned his back and said to one of the laughing guys. “Mr James, your rock appears to be in the same position.”
The guy’s snicker dropped and he turned back to his rock.
“You saw it move, didn’t you?” Juliet said.
“You definitely moved it. All there is to do now is move it an obvious distance so Mr French can’t disagree.”
“Shit, I can’t do that. It would mean taking in some of the surrounding energy. I find it so hard to determine how much is enough. I’ll end up on my ass and my name on the board for sure.”
“No, you won’t. I’m your cheerleader, remember? And now it seems I’m your good luck charm. You can do this.”
She heaved a breath and returned back to focus on her rock. I was close enough I could place my hand gently on her back, gentle enough I did not disturb her. Again her energy flowed into me, but instead of funneling it into the rock, I looked around the room, using my own concentration to try and see if I could feel this potential energy that was contained within most objects.
I wasn’t sure what I should be sensing. All I got was the feel of Juliet’s small energy rippling through me. That was not enough. Instead of using my eyes I closed them and relied on the ability that I had borrowed. I relied on Juliet’s ability to sniff out potential energy around her.